Chevron Corp.
CVX, -4.89%
shares rose 0.5%. The second-largest U.S. oil company late Tuesday filed an ethics complaint in a New York court, accusing New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli of siding with Ecuadorean plaintiffs in a multibillion-dollar environmental case against Chevron, in return for political contributions and other benefits.

Chevron said the comptroller and staff breached fiduciary and ethical duties in their positions with the New York State Common Retirement Fund, which owns more than $800 million in Chevron shares and is overseen by DiNapoli’s office.

In addition, the company alleged that plaintiffs’ supporters contributed more than $60,000 to DiNapoli’s political campaign. In return, the comptroller allegedly used his public office to push Chevron to settle the lawsuit via shareholder resolutions and public statements.

In a statement, the comptroller denied Chevron’s allegations as baseless and called them an attempt to intimidate him.

The complaint is the latest wrinkle in a long-running legal dispute between the company and indigenous groups in Ecuador’s Amazon region. They say Texaco operations caused harmful pollution there. Chevron, which denies the allegations, inherited the lawsuit when it bought Texaco in 2001.

Last year, a court in Ecuador found Chevron liable and levied an $18.2 billion judgment. In July, an Ecuadorean judge raised that amount to $19 billion. Chevron has said the ruling is the result of fraudulent evidence and has sought to block its enforcement.

A report released earlier this week said that nearly 1,200 new coal-fired power plants are being planned across the globe, mostly in India and China.

The World Resources Institute estimated that if all the projects were completed, they would add coal-power capacity equivalent to almost four times the current capacity of coal-fired plants in the United States. The proposed plants also would have total installed capacity of 1.4 million megawatts. Read more: Research identifies 36 plants slated for the U.S.

In energy futures, crude for January delivery
US:CLF3
rose 63 cents, or 0.7%, to settle at $87.38 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It touched a low of $86.37. Read more in Futures Movers.

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